3 exercises in discretion.

When somebody tells you they're driving to the clinic for a stress test, that's the wrong time to say that if they'd regularly walked to the clinic they probably wouldn't need any stress test. You may remember exactly how many release-your-inner-millionaire books a friend has ever bought. There's no good time to mention that number, ever. And listen. Someday, let's suppose somebody gets up in your face all belligerent and asks, “You think I care what you think of me?” That's probably a bad time to point out that they're asking your opinion of them, right there.

Dagnabit!

I'd like to think that every week I say a clever thing or two here, so that anybody who happens to be reading it will say to themselves, “You know, that's right. I never thought of it that way. The fella that writes this thing has a lot on the ball.” But I may instead be providing sidekick humor. Sidekick humor is when you say a dumb thing that inadvertently steers the main character toward a smart solution. So a scrawny bewhiskered geezer spouts some inanity, and Roy snaps his fingers and says brightly, “Say! That gives me an idea!”

Not You Again

Contrafact. There's a word I'd never heard before. It means a musical composition that uses the metric and harmonic structure of an earlier piece. Like, every 12-bar blues is a contrafact, or how you can play the Flintstones theme over the top of "I've Got Rhythm." Charlie Parker's "Ornithology" is a new melody for "How High the Moon." Weirdly, "The Horst Wessel Song" is a contrafact of "How Great Thou Art." It's not plagiarism; a copyright protects melody, not chord structure. It's like life- you can't fundamentally alter its shape, but you can play whatever you want over the changes.

Rockstar

I know this sounds like a retelling of The Aristocrats, but it's seriously totally true. Last decade, there was this great little band from Detroit that was creating quite a buzz. Big crunchy chords, clever and insightful lyrics, a guy named John Speck with for real one of the great rock voices ever. And they make an EP that gets some major label attention, get signed, make a full-length recording, which, okay, the label sits on it for too long, but finally it gets released. Then... nothing. No sales. No airplay. And The Fags go their separate ways.

A kept man

We are funny animals, easy to please as dogs. I got up too early, dragged my butt out of the house to have a series of cheerful women torment me with pointed instruments. But I feel gratified, because I was told what a fine job I'm doing with the floss and the brush. Good boy. Doglike, too, in this way: There was a time when I needed a lot of work from myself, but these days I'm always looking for ways to keep me exercised, so I don't mope and pine. I have become my own pet.

Dreamy

Back when I was a kid I would sit around and imagine I was a teenager. Then when I was a teenager I'd enjoy just sitting around imagining I was in a band. When I was in a band I would sit around imagining I was an actor, and when I had chance to do some acting, I'd sit around imagining I was on the radio. I used to imagine what it would be like to write for a living. Now I've finally figured out what my favorite thing to do is. Turns out I like sitting around imagining things.

Disclaimer

It's like trying to climb a ferris wheel; there's isn't time in a human life to write down even a single day. There's too much; you have to leave stuff out. Storytelling turns out to be subtractive, like coaxing Caesar's head out of a block of marble. Every sentence you write has an omission-to-inclusion ratio that's just staggeringly high. The thing is, every omission is a little falsehood. Like saying you went to the candy store but not mentioning you stole a box of Atomic Red Hots. All I'm saying is, don't expect to read the truth here.